This is my annual boring ranty post... well annual for two years now anyway.  And the one that marks my gesture of turning my blog pink for the month.  October is the month when we are all supposed to alert ourselves to the existence of breast cancer, which means all things pink (I so don't do pink!) fluffy (no disease is fluffy) and naff - silly Facebook status things about bra sizes (mind your own business) fruit equivalents (ditto) which don't really achieve a whole lot imo.

Scary to think that since my diagnosis, the greater part of of 100,000 more people have been diagnosed in the UK, and are even now coming to terms with that diagnosis or going through treatment.

So... the annual rant....

CHECK! CHECK! CHECK!  And if you don't know what you're looking for find out here.

Get screened if you are of screening age

Go to your GP IMMEDIATELY if you find anything odd - don't be fobbed off with a two week wait, tell them why you are calling

If you are male, don't think it can't happen to you, it can.  Every woman I know in the bc world has met at least one man with this disease... check your pecs!

Spending Saturday pushing myself up a mountain was about a lot of things... it was celebrating life, it was remembering absent friends, it was supporting friends... and it was about the hope (in a broadly Christian eschatological kind of a way) that one day there will be a cure, that one day ranty posts like this will be a memory.

Cancer, of any kind, is not a ribbon.  Nor is it, by any means, the only invisible disease.  But it is one where we can help ourselves by being alert and acting swiftly.

OK best stop ranting and do something holy!